Tag Archives: #amwriting

Avid readers of this blog (that'll be me, pretty much) might be wondering what, exactly, I've been doing these past couple of years. There was a book, then another one seemed to be reaching some kind of readiness, then - nothing.

The answer, as so often in life, is that there has been no one thing which has pushed me off schedule; life just got in the way - any writer will recognise that. Since last we met (barring a couple of posts down there which I've imported from my Tumblr pages), Shore Leave seemed to be more or less done, so why, you may ask, hasn't it emerged into the world? Well, it's a little complicated.

Shore Leave update:

It's done, and I'm almost happy with it. The trouble is, there's a lot of meaning packed into that 'almost'. A couple of years ago, I had the marvellous Bryan Tomasovich do a developmental edit on it, and he was enormously helpful, pointing out the areas where work was needed, (and being encouragingly kind about the rest of it) - I thought about it for a while, and then several things happened at once: we moved from Prince George to Victoria, there were all the usual things which go along with that process - new house, new job, new school for Conor, and the book sat on the back burner for a bit.

There are those who, on reading that, will exclaim that I should have just got on with it any way, but there was another problem.

The more I thought about Shore Leave and Bryan's comments, the more I realised that it needed a more substantial rewrite than at first appeared. This would mean effectively a second complete ground-up reconstruction, as the key weakness is that a minor character needs to become much more the antagonist of the story - this will work, it will make it all stronger, and 'll be happy about it when it's done, it's just that...

It's just that, having lived in my head for so long, I had no more mental energy to give another reworking of the story. It will rise again, and be better for this process, but as a way of easing me back into writing, it's a non-starter.

So, what now?

I have played about with the website (you might have noticed); in doing so, I hit upon the idea of refreshing the 50 Musical Memories to make them more interactive (and to fix many of the broken links), so I'm doing that, and I'm working on importing another two music-based projects which I've posted in other places over the years (I looked at 'Rediscovering Rush' yesterday, it's about 60,000 words as it stands; it'll take a while) - both of those will get rewrites as I go, and will appear on here as categories for those who are interested.

What about writing books?

I'm doing that, too. While Shore Leave sits there maturing, I'm actively writing two other stories, tentatively entitled A Little Bird Told Me and The Tip Run - both have a plot, a structure, and some substantive writing behind them; the former is taking shape more quickly than the latter; I'll be focusing on them just as soon as I get all the other stuff tidied away.

There's also a vague idea forming which looks like it might have a bit more of a science fiction concept; it's a great concept, but I can't fit a story into it just yet. I'll get there, though.

So, I'm not being idle; I am suffering a little from the whole 'too many things to choose from' problem, but I'm getting there. I'm setting myself a target of posting in here at least once a week - but I've said that before...

I first stopped listening to Rush sometime after 'Power Windows'. I don't really know why; I haven't stopped to analyse it too much; it's just one of those things that happened. Life went on; time failed to stand still; I got married, moved house, moved house again, changed jobs, lived life.

One day I was contemplating the tediously pointless daily car journeys I was making, and decided to buy myself a Rush album to while away the hours. So, I bought 'Hold Your Fire' on cassette tape, and I got right back into it all again.

I bought 'Presto' on tape, too. Then...

Then, nothing. I stopped again - this must have been about 1990. After that, Rush was just this band I used to listen to. My musical tastes changed, and for more than ten years now the only concerts I have gone to have been classical ones: I heard a magnificent Grieg Piano Concerto on Friday night; remind me to tell you about it some time.

Then I saw 'Different Stages' in a Virgin Megastore in Brent Cross one New Year - in the sale, it was, and I thought 'Why not?' And I was off again - it lived in my car CD player (I've moved on and - I like to think - up in cars since the 'Hold Your Fire' days) for months, and I grew to love all these old songs again. I even grew to love some of the new ones - that bass solo on 'Driven' is terrific, and I can't resist -er, 'Resist', being Scottish.

Then - you're probably getting the idea of this now.

Last Christmas, my family gave me an mp3 player. It's a nice one - a Creative Zen Touch - and it has room for lots of Mahler symphonies. And the odd bit of rock music. I loaded some things on there I hadn't heard for years - all that long-haired, sweaty music I loved 25 years ago - and I tried to pick just one representative Rush track to put on it.

And, of course, I couldn't. So I loaded up representative tracks from all the Rush albums. And then I realised that wasn't enough; I needed more. At the same time, following an intense period of work, I felt the need to get back to writing again, and needed a project to stimulate me.

So I hit on this idea of 'Rediscovering Rush'. I have been intrigued and fascinated these last few months to realise that these three guys mean more to me than anything else I listened to all those years ago. I'll be honest with you - they don't mean as much to me as some classical music does - please don't engage with me on the topic of Mahler's second symphony unless you want to be bored rigid by my private enthusiasms - but there is something special in their music, and I'd like to find out what it is.

So, here's the plan. Over the next - well, however long it takes, to be honest - I am going to listen to the entire Rush back catalogue on my little Zen Touch - while I'm exercising; while I'm flying to Italy (or Canada, soon); while I'm sitting here browsing while I should be working, and I'm going to write about it all. I'm going to try to find out just what connects so strongly with me, and I'm going to try to find out what I think of all this music now - am I more critical now? Am I still excited by it? Will I fall in love all over again with something I'd completely forgotten? Will I make it to the end of 'Feedback' with my sanity intact?

Tune in and find out. I don't really know where this will go, but I aim to have at least a little fun finding out.